1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to wireless communication devices and, more particularly, to ringer control for wireless communication devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
With recent advances in technology, mobile phones are able to be “active” continuously for periods of a week or more without recharging the phone's rechargeable battery. When mobile phones are active, they are able to receive incoming calls. Mobile phones include ringers that notify the user when a call is presently incoming.
Conventionally, mobile phones permit users to manually change the ringer-mode, such as to a vibrate-mode or a mute-mode, instead of a ring-mode. Hence, when the user of a mobile phone decides that they do not want to be disturbed, they are able to manually interact with the mobile phone to switch the ringer to either the vibrate-mode or the mute-mode. More recently, at least one mobile phone manufacturer has provided their mobile phones with a feature that allows users to define “profiles” for different situations, such that specific ringer tunes, modes or volumes can be used for specific situations. For example, the “profiles” might include normal, silent, meeting and outdoors. Hence, the user is able to interact with the mobile device to select a profile and thus manually switch to a particular profile and thus control the ringer mode. Hence, in situations in which users of mobile devices do not want to be interrupted or disturbed (such as while sleeping, during meetings or meal times), the user can interact with the mobile device to turn the ringer off or to switch the ringer to a vibrate mode.
Unfortunately, however, one disadvantage to conventional approaches towards manual ringer control is that users have to manually deactivate and reactivate the ringer. Often, however, a user forgets to later reactivate the ringer after the situation during which they did not want to be disturbed or interrupted has passed. In other words, with the busy and hectic schedules of users, users often forget to reset their device after a meeting or other situation that required the ringer to be deactivated. However, when the mobile device is thereafter left deactivated, the user may miss an important incoming call even though the call arrived after the event during which the ringer was to be deactivated.
Thus, there is a need for improved approaches to enable greater control over ringers of wireless communication devices.